Autor: Doran, Robert; Tyrrell, Bernard

Buch: Trinification of the Word

Titel: Doran, Robert - Christ and the Psyche

Stichwort: C.G. Jung: Indiviudation, persona; Ich-Komplex, Komplex, das Bewusste, Unbewusste

Kurzinhalt: It should be pointed out that consciousness for Jung is itself a complex, whose centre is the ego. In general, consciousness for Jung is ego-consciousness, whereas the unconscious is everything that lies beyond the ego's differentiated realm.

Textausschnitt: Consciousness and the Unconscious

113a Individuation is the process of becoming one's own self.1 Jung proposes it as an alternative to two different paths of alienation, one in which the self retires in favor of social recognition or the persona, and the other in which the self is identified with a primordial image or archetype. The process of individuation occurs by way of the ego's conscious negotiation with the complexes of the unconscious. (Fs) (notabene)

113b Jung arrived at the notion of unconscious complexes very early in his psychiatric career. The instrument for his discovery was the association experiment, which revealed certain indicators of powerful emotions lying beyond the realm of consciousness. These phenomena were postulated by Jung to be the effects of concealed, feeling-toned complexes in the unconscious psyche.2 These complexes are the cause of dreams as well as of disturbances in the association experiment. Jung first defined the complex as "the sum of ideas referring to a particular feeling-toned event."3 He later added the notion of a nuclear element within each complex4 and distinguished between the emotional and the purposeful aspects of the complex.5 (Fs)

113c The feeling-toned complex is a common phenomenon, not limited to acute or pathological states or cases. Some, especially those connected with religious experience, even lead to long-lasting emotional stability.6 This discovery led Jung very early to grant a greater significance to the inner content of an emotional experience than was accorded it by Freud.7 Furthermore, complexes tend to exhibit a tenacious inner cohesiveness and stability, a unity of structure resulting from the association of feeling and idea. "Every minute part of the complex reproduced the feeling-tone of the whole, and, in addition, each affect radiated throughout the entire mass of the associated idea."8 (Fs)

Fussnote 6:
[...] It should be pointed out that consciousness for Jung is itself a complex, whose centre is the ego. In general, consciousness for Jung is ego-consciousness, whereas the unconscious is everything that lies beyond the ego's differentiated realm. We shall later be pointing to a different and, I believe, more accurate and far-reaching notion of both consciousness and the unconscious. For the moment, though, we are concerned only with Jung.


113d Complexes, then, are the structural units of the psyche.Each complex has a specific focus of energy and meaning, called its nucleus. While the psyche is a whole, its parts are relatively independent of one another. The ego is its central complex, but the ego must remain in harmony with its unconscious background. This it does by negotiating the other complexes, and thus preventing them from splitting away and forming a second authority to thwart the aims of the ego. This second authority never goes away, but "a living cooperation of all factors"9 is possible through the process of individuation. Complexes are miniature, self-contained personalities in their own right, but this need not at all mean the disintegration of personality. In fact, there is dormant within the psyche an image of wholeness which represents the goal of the development which is individuation. This image is progressively realized by the cumulative negotiation and integration of the complexes as they manifest themselves in dreams and other psychic phenomena. (Fs) (notabene)